Bruttig-Fankel

Bruttig-Fankel
Coat of arms
Bruttig-Fankel
Location of Bruttig-Fankel within Cochem-Zell district
Coordinates: 50°7′53″N 7°13′54″E / 50.13139°N 7.23167°E / 50.13139; 7.23167Coordinates: 50°7′53″N 7°13′54″E / 50.13139°N 7.23167°E / 50.13139; 7.23167
Country	Germany
State	Rhineland-Palatinate
District	Cochem-Zell
Municipal assoc.	Cochem
Government
• Mayor	Manfred Ostermann
Area
• Total	14.38 km2 (5.55 sq mi)
Elevation	85 m (279 ft)
Population (2015-12-31)
• Total	1,106
• Density	77/km2 (200/sq mi)
Time zone	CET/CEST (UTC+1/+2)
Postal codes	56814
Dialling codes	02671
Vehicle registration	COC
Website	www.bruttig-fankel.de

Bruttig-Fankel is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Cochem-Zell district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde of Cochem, whose seat is in the like-named town.

The municipality lies on the river Moselle (kilometres 57-59; Lower Moselle) and, as the name suggests, is made up of the two constituent communities of Bruttig and Fankel.

Yearly precipitation in Bruttig-Fankel amounts to 716 mm, which falls into the middle third of the precipitation chart for all Germany. Only at 43% of the German Weather Service’s weather stations are lower figures recorded. The driest month is February. The most rainfall comes in June. In that month, precipitation is 1.8 times what it is in February. Precipitation varies moderately. At 46% of the weather stations, lower seasonal swings are recorded.

The oldest evidence of settlers in the area is the very well preserved barrows on the Bruttig-Fankeler Berg (the local mountain) along the so-called Rennweg, an old linking road between the Roman long-distance roads, over which today runs the “Archaeological Hiking Trail” (Archäologischer Wanderweg). According to information from the State Office for Care of Monuments in Koblenz, some of these barrows date back to the Bronze Age.

Bruttig-Fankel has both Celtic-Roman and Merovingian-Frankish beginnings, with the constituent community of Bruttig likely being the older of the two. It had its first documentary mention on 4 June 898 as Pruteca im Mayengau in a donation document from the Lotharingian king Zwentibold, whose beneficiary was the Imperially immediate, free-noble convent in Essen. Besides many holdings in the Cologne and Bergheim area, the king transferred to the convent “…in pago magnensi in villa pruteca terra arabilis cum curtile et vineis…” (roughly translated: “…in the Mayen country in the village of Bruttig an estate with associated arable earth and vineyards…”). This document establishes that the village is at least 1,100 years old, likely even older, for there was already an estate with vineyards. A further clue as to the village’s Celtic beginnings can be found in the name “Bruttig” itself. Language scholars derive the modern name from the Celtic Brutiacum (“Brut’s Dwelling”) through the Latin Proteca (AD 898) and Prodecha (1250) to today’s Bruttig (or variant Pruttig)